5th Challenge

ACTIVITY 1 Match the following words with the translation

ACTIVITY 2 Read the following nutritional recommendations.

ACTIVITY 3 Read PAGE 3 of the following document: “Food Label Checklist: The 10 Things That Must Be On Every Food Label”

Check the following labels and complete the activities:

A. Each label provides nutritional information for different quantities. Find the reference quantity for each product. For example, in the Siggi’s yogurt label the reference quantity is 170g, but in other labels it may be in ml, etc.

Traffic light (food) labelling System

What do you think about this idea?

Healthy Food Means a Happy & Healthy Body

In 2007, Food Standard Agency of UK developed a method of labeling food with a traffic light showing how much fat, sugar and salt are in that food. High Content (unhealthy) is shown by red, Medium (moderate) by amber and Low (healthy) by Green colors.

Food with Green color is preferred over the ones with red color.

This is called as Traffic Light Labeling System.

The main objective of Traffic Light Labeling guidelines is to:

• Allow consumers to correctly identify healthier food products

• Help consumers to make comparison between products easily

• Allow consumers to make these comparisons at a glance (visually)

The label is supposed to be in front of the package and easier to spot.

HOW DOES THE FOOD LABELING SYSTEM WORK:

The traffic light labeling system uses three colors:

RED

It indicates that the food is high in fat, sugar or salt. It is best to avoid these kinds of food and can be eaten only rarely. Unhealthy.

AMBER

This indicates that content of fat, sugar or salt is medium in these foods and can be eaten occasionally but not on a regular basis. There may be an even healthier option in the shop, so keep looking! Moderate.

GREEN

This colour indicates it is low in fat, sugar or salt and can be eaten or consumed regularly. It is the healthiest of choices. Healthy.

For every product the amounts of key nutrients (fat, saturated fats, sugars and salt) are given in grams per 100 grams or 100 millilitres, as a uniform reference value. Consumers interpret this information, with the common traffic light colours of red, amber or green, depending on whether the product contains high, medium or low levels of the respective nutrient.

Remember, many foods will have a mixture of red, amber and green – try to go for the product with more greens and ambers and less reds for a healthy diet!

BUT, does it really work? Why was it rejected in Spain?

Here comes the problem. If, as they say, it theoretically helps consumers to see at a glance the nutritional value of what they are about to buy at the supermarket, why was it rejected in Spain? In 2016, the Ministry of Agriculture rejected this “nutritional traffic light” because it could confuse consumers while trying to choose the healthier product.

As an example of this controversy, we will cite the case of olive oil. This food, whose health benefits have been scientifically proven, has a high fat content. Although these are healthy fats for the organism, according to the parameters of this system it would be labeled in red. The same would happen with walnuts, for instance. On the opposite side of this controversy we have the case of light soft drinks. Since they do not contain sugars or calories, they would be labeled green, when in reality their consumption should be sporadic.

The labeling of these nutrients should be separately and not as a whole.

Ultimately we will have to wait for governments, institutions, companies and consumers to agree on a single system of product labeling. Until that happens, other initiatives keep appearing to help us eat better. Such is the case of My Health Watcher, an app that interprets products when their bar code is scanned. With this information users will know which packaged products are the healthiest with regard to their age, weight, cholesterol level or intolerances.